Ravens of Avalon (26 page)

By the time Prasutagos reached them, Pollio had also gotten his mount under control. He nodded with a wary courtesy. “Greetings, my lord.”

Boudica watched with mingled amusement and consternation. How long had they been in sight before Bogle noticed Prasutagos and started barking? And what, at that distance, could he have seen?

What, indeed, was there to see? Would I really have allowed the Roman to kiss me?
She felt nothing for Prasutagos, but next to him the Roman looked—small.

“It is a cold day for riding,” the king observed. “We don’t often have such a storm.” He turned to Boudica. “I was at Coric’s steading near the harbor. A roof on one of his outbuildings collapsed from the weight of the snow. I thought I should see if you needed any help here.”

It was a reasonable question. The steading had been in some disrepair when she arrived. And she knew that during the past six months Prasuta-gos had spent most of his time traveling from one steading to another. To strengthen ties between king and people, they said, but it might be that he could not bear living at Eponadunon, either. Surely it was chance that he had happened to be in this part of his lands when the storm struck. But whether it was a happy chance or an ill one she did not know.

“Everything seems to be secure,” she answered neutrally.

“That is good news,” said Prasutagos. He turned to the Roman. “To lodge your men and mine we will need the second roundhouse, and it would be best to have the horses under shelter as well.”

“Oh there will be no need to crowd your warriors.” Pollio’s lips stretched in an equally polite smile. “If we push on we should reach the ferry by nightfall. I have messages for the Brigante king that cannot wait, and I must take advantage of the calm to cross before more bad weather rolls in.”

Before Prasutagos arrived, thought Boudica, he had seemed quite willing to spend the night with her.

“Perhaps you are wise,” the king said thoughtfully. “A ship came in just before the storm, so you will not have to wait long. Greet Venutios and Cartimandua for me.”

“I am sorry we will not have the pleasure of your company.” Boudica let the Roman take that as he would. “But I understand the claims of duty.”
Including,
she wondered warily,
my own?

Prasutagos had visited from time to time when he was in the neighborhood, staying long enough for a meal, but always off again before dark, checking on her as he would any other possession, she thought bitterly. The first few times she had scarcely noticed whether he was there or not, but lately she found his detachment a little unnerving.

Bogle sat down in the snow, tongue lolling, as Pollio summoned his men and the little troop plodded off down the road.

“They ought to thank us for breaking trail for them,” observed Bi-tuitos, the older of the two warriors who were the king’s primary guards. As big a man as Prasutagos, but ten years younger, he was some kind of cousin, with the family size and strength and coloring.

“But they had better hurry,” added Eoc Mor, equally tall, but with the brown hair and gray eyes of the older race. He had been destined for life as a farmer until someone noticed how deadly quick he was with a sword. “If the Roman cannot read the weather, I can, and clouds are building eastward that will bring more snow before dawn!”

It was true that the wind was beginning to rise, with a damp chill that cut deeper than the crisp cold of the morning.

“Perhaps we, too, should be on our way,” she suggested. “When we met the Romans I sent Temella to warn the household we would have guests. It is just as well you arrived—it would have been a pity to waste the food.”

ituitos had read the weather rightly. By sunset the wind was driving the first flurries of snow across the downs. The interlaced framework of beams and withies that supported the thatched roof flexed and groaned with each gust and changing pressure sent smoke from the hearth-fire billowing beneath its tall peak. No one suggested that the king and his men should ride anywhere in such a storm, if indeed Prasutagos had ever had such an intention. She was aware of his presence as she had not been before, and did not know whether it was he who had changed, or she. He seemed thinner, she thought, fined down by hard riding to whipcord muscle and bone. Firelight glinted on his mustache and burnished the strong modeling of cheekbones and jaw.

There were two roundhouses at the farmstead, along with other buildings for stabling and storage. When the last of the mutton stew had been eaten, most of the king’s men were sent off to the second house where old Kitto and his wife lived with the other men who worked the farm. Even to unlace the hide that covered the doorway long enough to let them out let in a chilly blast that left Boudica shivering. The hides and rugs of heavy wool that hung on the inner side of the house walls caught some of the drafts, but the same permeability that allowed smoke to escape outward through the thatching also allowed cold air to filter in.

Temella found more skins and blankets, and Bituitos and Eoc rolled themselves into them beside the fire where Bogle already lay snoring, his heavy head resting on a bone. Usually, in weather as cold as this, Temella and Boudica would share a bed, but the girl was laying out her own bedding in the partitioned section that was old Nessa’s place. That seemed to answer the question of where Prasutagos would be sleeping. Boudica could feel his gaze following her as she banked the fire.

“Lady of the holy fire, ward this flame till morning. Brigantia, blessed one, be you the fire in the hearth as you are the fire in the heart. Against all evil that walks the night be our shield and protection.” She drew the Lady’s sun-cross in the ash and rose to her feet, dusting her hands.

As she started to turn, the king rose and fell into step beside her. She controlled a flinch—she had forgotten how tall he was. Together they passed through the wool curtains Boudica had woven in her own clan’s russet and gold and gray to hang from the houseposts that defined her sleeping place. Swiftly she stripped off shawl and her outer tunic and shoes and lay down in shift and gown, curling defensively against the cold and away from the man whom she could hear taking off his own outer garments. The straw beneath the sheepskins and linen sheet rustled as Prasutagos got into bed beside her. She did not speak, but surely a turned back made her wishes clear.

Boudica had forgotten that for some things he needed no words at all.

She had been braced to resist his courtship, but this time there were none of the sweet whispers with which he had taken her virginity, only the rasp of his breath in her ear. She stiffened as he pulled up the skirts of shift and gown and curled around her, those strong hands, calloused from sword and bridle, taking possession of all that lay beneath. In silent fury she tried to break free, but legs that could grip a horse’s barrel held hers, one muscled arm pinioned her arms while the other hand relearned the shape of her breasts.

“You are my wife …” Words escaped set teeth as the same force that gave him the strength to hold her broke through the barriers that had kept him silent. She could feel each tremor that shook his body, pressed so tightly against hers. “You may live without a man … but you shall not lie with any … man … but … me!”

That answered the question of whether he had seen Pollio try to kiss her.

Boudica was still trying to think of a response when with a last agile shift he had her, and as once before, when her body was constrained, her outrage exploded inward, driving the thinking self to one side. The Roman had called her a fire, and now she was bursting into flame.

I am the oven that bakes the bread …
said a voice within.
I am the kiln that fires the cup … I am the forge that shapes the blade. Burn!

When Boudica woke the next morning, the snow had ceased and Prasutagos was gone. She might have thought his visit all a dream, but by the Turning of Spring, she knew that she was once more with child.

pring came to the Tor bearing a treasure of golden kingcup and yellow flag and heralded by a clamor of returning birds. To Lhiannon, it seemed as if the lengthening days were one long morning, releasing her from the shadows in which she had walked since the fall of the Dun of Stones. The long, slow cycles of winter had accorded with Lhiannon’s mood, but with spring, the pace of life grew frenetic, and as she felt that same energy burning in her own veins she realized that so far as she would ever be, she was healed.

Soon, she knew, she would have to leave the Tor, but as the world hovered at the Turning of Spring she found herself as undecided as the season. A year ago at this time she and Ardanos had been preparing to defend the Dun of Stones. Now the dun bore a Roman fort and most of the south and west were in Roman hands. Governor Plautius was driving westward across the midlands. Caratac had gone to ground somewhere in the mountains beyond. Even if Lhiannon had been willing to face more war there was nothing for her to do.

On the first fair day after the equinox an excess of energy drove her up the Tor. This time she did not walk the spiral, but it scarcely mattered. Her awareness of the Otherworld was always with her now. Wind ruffled the new grass. Below, the marshland pools, still full from the spring rains, spread across the levels in a shifting mosaic of silver and blue. But the spring sun was warm on her shoulders, and when she reached the summit she lay down to rest.

Whether what came upon Lhiannon then was sleep or a vision she was never sure, but it seemed to her that she was in a place of wide skies and open fields where the air had the scent of the sea. Boudica was with her, more beautiful than ever, her breasts full but her face fined down to reveal the lovely curves of cheek and brow. In her eyes Lhiannon saw a grief to match her own.

“Lhiannon …”
across the miles she heard the cry.
“Lhiannon, I am afraid. I need you … come to me!”

oudica knelt at the edge of the offering pit, fingering the ridges that ornamented the curve of the bowl she held. It was a fine piece of cream-colored pottery in the Gallic style her people had brought with them from across the sea, one of a set that had been included in the wedding treasure sent over from Eponadunon when she had taken up residence at Danatobrigos. It was filled with early primroses now, picked as she came through the wood that partly surrounded the Horse Shrine at the foot of the hill. On the other side the ground was open toward the path that ran alongside the stream. In the center of the enclosure the skull of the most recent equine sacrifice contemplated her from its pole.

“You old ones who were here before,” she whispered. “Your dust is part of the earth whose fruits feed me and my child. Give us your blessing.”

Prasutagos’s winter visit had shattered her peace. The quickening of her child roused her to panic and a frantic search for ways to protect the new life within. Once more, she had something to lose.

“The ghosts of this land have taken one life from me,” she went on. “Surely you don’t need another! Please accept this offering!”

As she stretched to lower the bowl she lost her balance and the smooth ceramic slipped from her hand, hit a stone, and cracked. She collapsed onto hands and knees, staring as the water ran out and soaked into the soil. Like an afterimage came the memory of how the kings had broken the swords and bent the shields before offering them at the Lake of Little Stones. Was this a sign that the ancestors had accepted her offering or an omen that her womb was as useless as the broken bowl?

She was no Druid to interpret it! She had refused to become a priestess, abandoned her duties as wife and queen … would she ever be a mother? She hunched over her belly, weeping.

“Boudica? Who has hurt you, child? What is wrong?”

For a moment she thought that soft voice a figment of her memory. Then she heard a pony snort and the creak of harness. She turned, vision blurring at the sight of a thin woman in blue with golden hair. Slowly she got to her feet.

“Lhiannon? You’re real? I have wanted you so badly! Are you really here?” As the priestess slid down from her pony Boudica ran forward, hugging her in a tumult of mingled laughter and tears.

“You’ve lost none of your strength, at any rate,” Lhiannon said when Boudica released her at last. “And you are blooming. But what are you doing here? They told me I had some days of travel yet to reach Prasutagos’s dun. I only took this path to see if I might find a meal at the farm.”

“I am sure that Palos and Shanda would make you welcome, but there’s no need to trouble them when my home is just up the hill!” exclaimed Boudica. “The farm is busy with preparations for Beltane, but we can slaughter one of the lambs early for a feast of welcome! Follow me!”

As they walked perhaps she could find the words to tell Lhiannon all that had happened to her since they parted at Camulodunon. The gods knew she had rehearsed the story often enough during those sleepless nights when she longed for the other woman to come.

believe you,” said Lhiannon. “When the need is great there is power in such a cry. This time I heard you calling, I think, because I was on the Tor. I am only sorry …” She sighed, tugging on the rein by which she was leading the pony as it tried for a particularly juicy clump of new grass.

“That you did not hear me when I was birthing my son?” said

Boudica. “I do not blame you now. Even the greatest of priestesses could not have instantly transported herself all the way across Britannia.”